Sidewinders. William W. Johnstone

well as bein’ dumb and smellin’ like cowshit, Texans are gutless, too.”

      Bo had already taken note of the tied-down holster on the stranger’s hip and the fancy nickel-plated revolver that rode in it. This man was a gunslinger, or at least believed himself to be one. And it was certainly possible that he was fast and slick on the draw. Plenty of men on the frontier were.

      He wasn’t alone either. A couple of other men had also stepped out from the bar and were watching what was going on with keen interest. They had the hard-eyed look and low-slung guns of killers, too, just like their friend.

      The man called Langdon was grinning at Scratch. “Well, saddle tramp,” he prodded. “You got anything to say for yourself?”

      Scratch’s eyes blazed with anger, but he was making a visible effort to control himself. “You got no call to talk about Texas or Texans that way, mister,” he said, “but I reckon you’ve never been there, so I’ll just chalk it up to ignorance.”

      “Oh, I been there, all right. And I was about sick at my stomach the whole time just from the stink o’ the place. I tell you what really made me want to puke, though—the ugly women! I never saw an uglier bunch o’ females in all my borned days!”

      “That does it!” Scratch said. His muscles tensed as he readied himself to draw.

      Bo was watching the other two men, and saw them reaching for their guns before Scratch had even made a move. He knew exactly what they figured was going to happen. Langdon would get out of the way, and his two partners would fill Scratch full of lead. Then they would claim they’d just been protecting their friend from an unprovoked attack by a stranger in town. It was an old trick.

      Bo wasn’t going to let it happen.

      He still had a mostly full mug of beer in his hand. He let fly with it, flinging it mug and all into the face of one of the other gunmen as hard as he could. The man never saw it coming and went over backward as the heavy mug smashed into his nose. The beer from the mug splashed over the other man, distracting him long enough for Bo to lunge at him with surprising swiftness. The long black parson’s coat swirled out as Bo pivoted and slashed down with the gun that had appeared almost as if by magic in his right hand. The barrel slammed against the skull of the second gunnie, right above the ear. The man went down hard, just like his companion.

      Scratch’s common sense and battle savvy won out over the fury caused by the insults Langdon had leveled at Texas—and its women. At the same time as Bo was making his move against the other two men, Scratch’s left hand moved with flashing speed, not toward the gun he wore on that side but toward Langdon’s gun hand. Scratch’s fingers clamped around the man’s wrist and kept him from drawing his gun. Scratch’s right hand came up in a sizzling punch that crashed flush against Langdon’s jaw. The impact of the cleanly delivered blow drove Langdon to the side, against the bar. Scratch grabbed the back of his head, getting a good hold on the hair, and bounced Langdon’s face off the hardwood. The gunman’s knees unhinged. Scratch let go of him and allowed him to fall to the floor. He landed in the sawdust about the same time as his two partners.

      Scratch looked across the bar and saw the bartender gaping at him and Bo. “Just because a couple of fellas are gettin’ a mite long in the tooth don’t mean they can’t handle themselves in a ruckus anymore,” he said with a smile. “That’s worth rememberin’.”

      The bartender swallowed and then nodded, saying, “Yes, sir, I sure will.”

      Langdon and the man Bo had buffaloed with his gun were both out cold. The hombre who had caught the thrown beer mug in the face was still conscious but not interested in fighting. His nose was leaking blood and not exactly the right shape anymore. He groaned as he cupped his hands over his face.

      Bo still had his gun drawn. He wasn’t just watching the man with the broken nose. He had an eye on the rest of the men in the saloon as well, especially Dave, Angus, and Culley. Those three hadn’t moved during the brief fight, which surprised Bo a little. He had thought that they might try to take advantage of the situation and attack him and Scratch again.

      The batwings were slapped open and a beefy, middle-aged man with gray hair and a mustache came into Sharkey’s carrying a shotgun. A tin star was pinned to his leather vest. His eyes spotted the gun in Bo’s hand right away. As the Greener swung in that direction, the star packer said, “All right, mister, just put that gun on the bar easy-like and step away from it.”

      “Sure, Marshal,” Bo replied in a calm voice, although he didn’t make a move to comply with the order just yet. “Since you’re here, I reckon you’ll make sure nobody else in this place tries to ventilate my partner and me.”

      “Nobody’s gonna ventilate anybody,” the lawman snapped. “Unless it’s me doin’ the ventilating. Now put that gun down.”

      Bo shrugged and placed the Colt on the bar. He moved away from it a little…but stayed within arm’s reach.

      That seemed to be enough to mollify the marshal. He said, “Claremont, what the hell’s goin’ on here? Somebody came runnin’ down to my office sayin’ that a war was about to break out in here!”

      Claremont turned out to be the bartender. He said, “There was, uh, a disagreement between Langdon and this fella here in the buckskin jacket. I told both of ’em that I didn’t want any trouble in here, but they were bound and determined to start something.”

      Scratch glared at the drink juggler, who wasn’t telling things exactly the way they had happened. Chances were, the man was a little worried about making enemies out of Langdon and the other two gunnies. That was understandable, but Scratch didn’t have to like it.

      “Who are you?” the marshal demanded of Bo and Scratch. “I don’t think I’ve seen the two of you in Red Butte before.”

      “That’s because we just rode in earlier this afternoon,” Bo said, keeping his voice calm and level. “We’d never been here before.”

      “What’re you doin’ here now?”

      “We came in with the stagecoach,” Scratch said. “It was us who kept it from bein’ robbed.”

      The marshal’s frown deepened. “Yeah, I heard about that. You two are the fellas who had that shoot-out with Rance Judson’s gang?”

      “That’s right,” Bo said. “We’re working for Mrs. Sutherland now, so I guess she can vouch for us—”

      The batwings were shoved aside violently again, and the man who strode in, followed by several more gun-hung hombres, heard Bo’s statement and thrust out an arm, pointing accusingly at Bo and Scratch.

      “I should have known when I heard that some of my men were in trouble down here!” this man said. “Those two are hardcases hired by that woman. And look what they’ve done to Langdon, Simms, and Bartlett. Marshal, I demand that you throw them in jail, where their kind belong!”

      CHAPTER 7

      The man blustering just inside the saloon entrance was tall and broad-shouldered, with a ruggedly powerful face that showed he had spent a lot of time outdoors. He wore a brown tweed suit and a dark brown Stetson, and the butt of a gun carried in a cross-draw rig stuck out from under the suit coat on the left side.

      The four men with him were cut from the same cloth as Langdon and the other two, which led Bo to make a guess based on what Abigail Sutherland had told him earlier. That guess was confirmed when the marshal said, “Take it easy, Mr. Rutledge, I’m lookin’ into this.”

      “Damn it, Harding,” Jared Rutledge shot back, “I don’t want you ‘looking into it.’ I want you to arrest those troublemakers! Abigail Sutherland probably put them up to attacking my men!”

      “You’d better rein in your hoss, mister,” Scratch said in a low, dangerous voice. “Miz Sutherland didn’t have anything to do with this fracas. Fact of the matter is, it was your men who started it by insultin’ the great state o’